


Jokes On You

by Angelic_Observer



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Banter, Friendship, Gen, John Sheppard & Rodney McKay - Freeform, could be read as slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-13
Updated: 2016-03-13
Packaged: 2018-05-29 03:34:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6357268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angelic_Observer/pseuds/Angelic_Observer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sheppard hears that McKay is more irritable than usual after beginning another double shift, and heads down to the science lab to cheer the guy up a little. Set one week after the SGA teams arrived in Atlantis.</p><p>A short story written for Aicon 2016's fanfiction competition. Winner of the 'Innovation' award.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jokes On You

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my beta, [kashiichan](http://archiveofourown.org/users/kashiichan/pseuds/kashiichan). Without them this story would not have been completed on time.

Sheppard heads down to the lab. Last he’d heard, McKay had decided to pull another impromptu double duty night time lab shift. Sheppard has barely known the guy for a week, but this seemed to be a natural occurrence in the scientist’s routine. Maybe he should start abbreviating it to ‘IDNTLS’. But that’s not very catchy, and anyway, McKay takes on extra work during the day too, not just at night time. Maybe it should just be ‘impromptu double lab exertion’? Wait no, that’d give it the initials ‘IDLE’. While he wants to have fun with this, Sheppard didn’t want to alienate the guy by implying McKay was lazy, or that he tries to avoid doing work. Quite the opposite, actually; he was always rushing around trying to fix up one piece of machinery or another.

Sheppard thinks it over as he turns another corner. He’ll come up with something; he’s really good with nicknames. Either way, the few scientists that had been milling around the mess hall after dinner had been commenting on McKay’s snappy attitude, claiming that it was even worse than usual. A spontaneous visit to the lab to swap retorts might even do him some good.

Sheppard can tell that even though McKay scowls at a great deal of what’s said between them, he secretly enjoys the attention. The guy’s a ball of hyperactive information, able to dumb down complicated science _and_ covert highly complicated engineering specs into comic book analogies. Sheppard chuckles to himself. Maybe if he tells the guy a lame joke or something it’ll improve his attitude a little. If he’s honest with himself, half the fun of talking with McKay is listening to him analyze every aspect of something, then complain about it. Not that Sheppard would ever admit to enjoying something like that.

The door of the lab swishes open at Sheppard’s mental command, and there he is. McKay is typing on his laptop, alternating between it and his tablet. Zelenka, the Czech scientist, is also still in the lab, typing on his own laptop just a few tables away. They both look a little stressed. Sheppard lets the door close behind him and watches them work for a bit, gauging the situation, then walks up behind McKay and casually leans his elbow on the table in a ‘relaxed’ stance.

“So I opened up my ‘E’-mail this morning,” Sheppard says easily, emphasizing the vowel, “and a thought struck me: whatever happened to A, B, C and D mail?”

Not looking up, Rodney slowly pushes Sheppard’s elbow off the table, forcing him to step away if he wants to avoid toppling sideways. Sheppard turns the movement into a casual stroll around to the other side of McKay’s table.

“You actually _read_ your e-mails now?” Rodney asks irritably. “Don’t you just forward everything to everyone else?”

Sheppard smirks, and has just opened his mouth to retort when McKay continues talking.

“‘E’, as even _you_ should know, stands for ‘electronic’, as in ‘electronic mail’. Messages distributed by electronic means from one computer user to another via a network, which –”

Sheppard leans over the table to stop him, touching a hand to his shoulder. “McKay, I know what it stands for. It was a joke.”

Rodney shrugs his hand off and frowns. “A joke?”

“An exchange of words, with the intentional outcome of laughter or amusement,” says Sheppard primly, mimicking the tone of McKay’s previous explanation.

“I know what a joke is!” Rodney says, finally looking up. “You’re just not as funny as you think you are.”

Sheppard feigns hurt by putting his hand to his chest in a dramatic fashion. “I’ll have you know that people hold their sides when I’m around, ‘cause I put them in stitches.”

Rodney rolls his eyes and goes back to typing on his laptop.

“You want proof?” Sheppard turns to Zelenka and addresses him in a slightly louder voice. “Hey, Zelenka, opened any e-mails recently? You ever wonder what happened to A, B, C, and D-mail?

“‘E’ is for electronic,” Zelenka replies distractedly. “It is useful communication method people use to answer questions from science staff, when they have question for Atlantis Military Commander.” He goes back to his computer work, clearly preoccupied.

Rodney smirks, his fingers stilling on the laptop keyboard. “You’re right, that was very amusing.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it; answer my emails. Shut up.” Sheppard smirks. “Maybe dry humor’s just not your style. How about a classic? Knock knock.”

Rodney’s smirk turns into a frown. “Did you come all the way down here just to waste my time with pre-school humor?”

Sheppard’s smile curves into a grin. “Yes. Knock knock.”

“I am not going to give you the satisfaction of lowering my intelligence level with a below average jest aimed at four-year-olds,” Rodney huffs.

“Stop being anti-social and answer the door.”

“I’m not anti-social, I’m selectively social,” Rodney says primly. “There’s a significant difference.”

Sheppard gives up on him and turns to Zelenka. “Hey, knock knock.”

“It is open,” Zelenka says absently.

Rodney lets out a snort of amusement.

“Forgot I was in a room of scientists,” Sheppard says, shaking his head.

“It’s ironic really.”

“What is?” asks Sheppard.

Rodney rolls his eyes again. “That your sense of humor is a joke.”

Sheppard just laughs in response.

“Have you amused yourself enough now?” Rodney asks sarcastically. “Leave, so we can do something of actual importance. It’s not like I have twenty marines breathing down my neck to fix the hot water system in the living quarters or anything. Or do you need a drum beat and cymbal clash to make an exit?”

“Okay, okay, I get it. I’ll take my one-man moralizing band on the road.” Sheppard heads towards the door. “I’ll leave you with one last joke. It’s for all the mind-readers in the room. It goes like this—” He waits in the doorway for a moment, and then Atlantis’ door swishes closed behind him.

“He thinks he’s _so_ funny,” Rodney complains to Zelenka, narrowing his eyes a little in annoyance. “At his age, he should have outgrown such childish behavior.”

“Yet we are amused, and atmosphere in room is much lighter, yes?” Zelenka points out. “Some people outgrow childish things, and certain Majors master them.”

“Majors with too much time on their hands, maybe,” Rodney grumbles quietly to himself. He catches himself smiling slightly though, and when he turns back to his work he starts to hum quietly.

Zelenka smiles to himself as the first few bars of Beethoven’s ‘Fur Elise’ drift over from Rodney’s work bench, mixed in with the off-beat tapping of keyboard keys. Rodney was too stubborn to admit that Sheppard had affected him, but: “You seem in happier mood now, yes?”

“Oh, shut up.”

Zelenka grins widely as he continues his own typing.

Rodney shakes his head at him and delves back into re-writing the Ancient coding he needs if he’s going to be able to integrate some particularly stubborn converters into the main system. The new script that the other scientists had been working on all afternoon contained bits of code that were almost useful, and there was no way Rodney was going to go to bed before re-writing it. He’d dubbed this particular section: ‘The Matrix: Written By Idiots’.

If the ‘atmosphere’ was ‘lighter’ and Rodney was able to concentrate better on his task, it was purely a coincidence. It _definitely_ had nothing to do with Sheppard’s impromptu visit.

  


  


**Author's Notes:**  
I like to think that John Sheppard eventually nicknamed Rodney McKay’s extra lab time as: ‘Rodney’s impromptu double duty lab exertion’ (RIDDLE), to represent the enigma that is Rodney McKay. Plus that would be infuriating for Rodney to hear, catchy, and it would also be a logic riddle. People would have to figure out what the acronym meant if it caught on – a win/win/win for Sheppard. =P


End file.
